An Interview With Pop Singer-Songwriter Arden Kaywin - Page 2

"I loved New York, too, and I never thought I would move to Los Angeles ever. I thought 'I am a sophisticated New Yorker' and then just by circumstances, family, and other things (my brother lives in L.A.), I ended up in Los Angeles and I love it! If you had told me when I was living in New York that I would end up in L.A. and loving it, I would have said you were crazy!

"I was doing this very different thing that I had spent my whole adolescence and my whole college life training for and it wasn't making me happy. I was good at it and it was the kind of thing that if you're good at and if you can do it professionally, then you do it. Never mind are you happy. It just dawned on me that I am almost 25 and there is so little time. If I'm not happy, what am I doing this for? What am I waiting for?

"I wasn't sure what I wanted to do, then I ended up getting to collaborate with a film scorer and she and I wrote a few songs together and we recorded them. It was my first experience in a recording studio and I just loved it — this is what I'm going to do. I need to write and make an album and I left New York and came to L.A. and there you have Quarter Life Crisis. In a matter of two months, I did a complete 180. I moved cities, I changed careers, and I became single."

Several songs on Quarter Life Crisis, including "Over You" and the single "Me with Me," talk of her struggle to overcome lost love. The song "Numb" speaks of trying to survive the pain of a break-up.

"I was in a relationship for 6 years with a very wonderful person but it just wasn't the right relationship. We had just broken up and all of that, in terms of changing careers and moving cities and all of that. This whole record was written during and after that time so it was all about sorting out my independence and being in a new city and figuring out what I want and feeling empowered and totally freaked out at the same time."

Article Author: A.L. Harper

I'm a writer and music journalist originally from Salt Lake City, but now living in Scotland. I was a Punk/Goth in the '80s and these artistic influences have stayed with me; although a love of Chopin, chamber music, and Spanish guitar would seem to belie this. …

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